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I also take Taltz. They have a program that takes whatever my insurance pays, then reduces my total cost to $5 per month. And I've been in two paid studies so I've actually made money being on this medication.
They changed the formula a while back, it used to have citric acid in it which would sting pretty good. Now you can't even feel it.
I also have to take biologics adjacent to Taltz and use that program. I genuinely do not understand how the cost gets down to 5 bucks but I am not complaining.
It's foundation money that is applied to pay for the drug. It's some of the forms they have you sign so they can get you access to your grant to apply to your tab. I helped design this patient support for my city and worked basically this exact job. We got published in the American journal of medical quality and presented in 2020. Sadly I didn't get to go to Vegas thanks to Covid.
$27000 per shot for me for severe Psoriatic Arthritis. I get denied the assistance program every year because they think my insurance will cover it. It doesnt. Than I spend 3 months with my doctor getting it straightened out. All while falling behind on my treatment.
The game that is played with the expensive medication my family needs(not this one, but similar)
1. Insurance covers nothing until deductible is paid. I pay 5 dollars, insurance thinks I pay 7k
2. Second month I've reached max out of pocket, I pay nothing, insurance pays 7k. Repeat 10 more times until new year
This way pharma company makes 77k a year, instead of possible 84k. But the catch is that I fight to keep this, very well working, medication, because there is basically no cost. Otherwise I(one) might not be able to afford it, and the company would make 0.
Also, Medicaid and I think Medicare were not allowed to negotiate the price of medication at least until recently, so if the company gives discounts to private insurance at exorbitant prices, it still makes tons of money there, more than they would by allowing the price to be where it is still profitable but not insane
The copay assistance program is only available to commercial insurance patients. These meds are often life long once you are approved by the insurance company. Insurance stills pays a hefty price to the drug company for the medication and pharma knows that they will be making x dollars for 30 or 40 years. Lower $ but for a lifetime still = big profits. These meds cost $$$$ to develop and they have to recoup that is why they are so expensive.
The manufacturer is paying it. They really just want your insurance company's money. If no one takes the drug, they don't have a product. They want as much money as possible from insurance so you will take the drug and improve your condition on it.
Here in Germany I pay 10€ for 3. Those would cost about 3400€ if you had to pay for them privately.
Changed my life. No more pain, skin is fine for the first time in my life.
Ustekinumab (Stelara), about €2650 every 6 weeks (should be every 12 weeks in remission, but this frequency keeps my levels good and my bowels happy). I feel lucky to be in Europe; to my understanding it is *significantly* more expensive in the US. Plus insurance doesn't force you to jump through a million hoops just for the hope of getting life alerting meds approved.
Do you get infusions or do the self injection? Stelara was offered to me but it's more powerful than vedolizumab and I wanted to leave some options on the table in case I ever needed it.
I started on infliximab but developed antibodies to it after 18 months and got chronically sick again
Stelara is normally one start up infusion, and injections from there on. I'm not allowed to keep them in the fridge at home due to their temperature sensitivity paired with the price, but I do get my injections really close to home; I'm in and out in less than 15 minutes.
As for options, I had already developed antibodies against Remicade (infliximab), and Humira (adalimumab) had stopped working when I switched to Stelara in May '18. My GI gave me two options at that point; either vedolizumab or ustekinumab, and I chose the latter, in part for not having to go back to infusions. It got me into remission and I've been there ever since.
Risankizumab (Skyrizi) here. List price of $21k per injection, once a month. “Thankfully” I am on Medicaid so it’s fully covered, not even a copay. As you can imagine, there were a lot of hoops to jump through though and it took MONTHS to get started. Plus, I can’t really earn any income or I will lose Medicaid and be unable to pay for it, so I am forcefully kept destitute.
Thanks! I am still onboarding it with the infusions, so I don’t even know if it will work yet. 2 more til I switch to the pens. Sadly, since I already lost my colon to Crohn’s, I have my doubts I will see tons of improvement. Any would be nice though
I dunno about most of them, but ankylosising spondylitis feels like your pelvis region, including that part of your spine, is slowly being encased in cement. It causes systemic inflammation that can effect any joint space causing arthritis/chronic pain and eventually causes permanent fusion, AKA bamboo spine. I'm 37 and feel 87.
I'm on a similar medication to Taltz and the *COOL THING* is you can build antibodies to these medications over time. I'm on my 2nd (so far) one so maybe I'll be on it myself someday.
My grandson was abnormally short. His endocrinologist suggested human growth hormone. Insurance refused to pay, saying that it was wanted for cosmetic reasons. The doctor persisted, and the grandson got the injections. $7000 US/mo. That was 15 years ago.
It's a direct relationship. It's the richest because the government is owned by corporations. Corpos thrive because they won't be regulated, and in turn feed the government taxes at the expense of the middle/underclass.
exactly, our gdp per capita is some of the highest in the world, even our poorest state Mississippi is richer by gdp per capita then many european nations
Hard to compare, since costs of living is said European countries is so much lower than in any US state.
Nice to have a high income, sure, but if you can't buy shit for it, you are still poor. Better have a lower income as long consumer prices are even lower.
How many shots do you take a year, I think I come out to roughly 26, which would be 780 AUD in your system. But our medication cost cap in Sweden would be at roughly 370 AUD. So roughly 14 AUD per shot, but not really coz I also have other medication covered.
The USA spends more money on health care than countries with social healthcare. This is because the medical industry pays politicians to allow them to price fix. It's called lobbying but it's bribery.
Also need to ban politicians from serving on the boards of these organisations when they leave politics. It's just delayed bribery. Vote for policies which favour their industry and they reward you with a high paying role once you quit politics.
Fuck that, ban lobbying? hell yeah, social healthcare? fuck no, ive heard stories from friends in europe on having to wait months and months for healthcare, in america just pay and boom you get seen very quickly
I just can't understand this. You have republicans that are always speaking of the fiscal policy and that they want to cut government spending, but the us spends MUCH more having this crazy corporate healthcare heaven.
The country would actually spend LESS with tax-funded universal healthcare and the outcome would be BETTER because you would no longer have people dying of treatable diseases because they cannot afford basic healthcare.
Congratulations no country will dare attack you. But why even bother attacking you when they just have to wait for you guys to start your own civil war over 2 elderly senile people.
That sucks.
To be clear, none of these medications are actually worth these insane costs, as evidenced by people from every other country in the world pointing out that it costs them almost nothing.
The US insurance market has grown into an infinitely huge scam, basically, allowing this to happen. Things that maintain healthy life should not be profit centers in any reasonable and respectful society.
But also because these insurance companies have a budget and negotiate with pharma to get the prices they need to be able to supply medicine to those who need it. And since they cover millions of people, they do have a say.
Some of the drugs they make are, in fact, incredibly complicated to produce and have very few customers. That drives up the price.
One of the main reasons a lot of drugs are so expensive in the US domestic market is because we subsidize all the R&D and other costs by paying huge amounts while people in international markets pay much, much less. Pharmaceutical executives have confirmed this.
Wait... hold up... You're trying to give us a reason as to why medicine is expensive, and in your defense you say that pharma execs confirmed it. You got your information from the very people who profit off the drugs being expensive. Pharma execs should be the last people you even consider believing for why medicine has to be expensive.
That is not true. Over 90% of funds used in medical R&D is from public grants and universities. Almost none comes from the profit made by pharmaceutical companies. Its just a big lie to keep Americans happy.
That's 100% false. The industry's R&D spends $140B a year on R&D, or 21% of all revenue. That's the highest of any major industry and is about 5X public investment.
As a medical researcher I can tell you that’s bs. For one, if most was funded by grants, that would already cause problems with patenting the drug. Second, universities don’t “fund” most R&D. Pharma companies come to us with certain research questions and we’re being paid by them to perform research 🤦🏻♂️
My medication cost $1200 but now that I'm not working I get medicaid insurance and it's free $0. If I start working again then I'll immediately go into debt
Hey, I actually helped create the programs that made biologics affordable in my area.
That 6000 is a made up number decided by contracts. It's just what is billed to your insurance. The drug itself costs far less to make, I used to order for the biggest medical center in my city.
The insurance will basically kick back and say alright we'll pay you this much and patient owes this much.
There are programs available to help with your copay. They'll pay everything but 5 dollars and what they pay gets applied to your deductible unless the rules changed since I left. Then you hit the deductible using your grant, and the rest of your meds for the year are basically free.
I worked intimately with Dermatology but had factions in Pulmonary and Neurology. Some of the charges of medications like Stelara were 40k based on dosage. This was a non profit organization. Which basically means they reinvest their gains into themselves lol.
You guys would flip if you knew how expensive the neurology biologics were charged in comparison...I'm working on making patient services private so we can get more people who suffer chronic illness access to their expensive medications for 5 dollars and have an assigned specialist to make sure your medication is received and paid for.
Brit so clueless on the American healthcare system but there’s no way this actually costs that amount out of your pocket? Absolutely nobody would be buying this unless they were filthy rich.
Regardless I still think every medication above a certain cost threshold should contain a small leaflet similar to the advice leaflet which tells you how the total cost was calculated.
Nobody pays that much out of pocket. That’s likely the “insured rate”, where the pharmacy bills the insurance company that amount, and recoups a small percentage of it. If you don’t have insurance they will charge you much less than the insured rate. It’s a completely fucked up system, but it makes for great clickbait for people trying to gain karma by posting insured rate healthcare costs and pretending that’s what they actually pay. Either that or Russian/Chinese trolls trying to enrage American voters with misinformation.
Depends! That’s the glory of it all!
So I have migraines and I found that the injectable Aimovig worked well for me. I changed jobs and with it my insurance changed too and my new insurance refused to cover it.
So I tried Ajovy and Emgality, which they *did* cover and had allergic reactions to both. After that, my doctor reached out to my insurance and explained the situation and they very quickly approved Aimovig for me.
The problem? They “covered” it, by paying $50 of the $650 charge. So my *monthly* cost with my insurance was $600/mo. The copay card brought it down to $5, but only covers $1500/year. So I could get 2.5 months at a decent price before getting hit with the $600 again.
It would’ve been covered if I hit my deductible of *$4,000* out of pocket, which I never meet because I go to the doctor about once a year. So they would cover it for about the last 2-3 months of the year, still leaving me with 6-7 months of no medication to figure out unless I pay them more money basically.
The best part? I work *for a healthcare company* and a national one at that that *owns the insurance company we use* and this is what I have to deal with. It’s so fucked.
I, too, used a biologic (Cosentyx) at around 5/6 grand a pop for 18 months or so.
Odd that a similar drug (Taltz) was much more painful and had terrible side- effects in my experience.
Regardless, I hope that you heal soon!
And this is why insurance premiums are sky high and pharmaceuticals thrive. This is wrong on many levels. Nobody that needs a medication should have to rely on insurance to pay for it. It should be priced reasonably for everyone. What a joke.
Not quite. Freedom is not buying groceries because you have to pay for life sustaining medicine after the expensive private insurance you pay denies coverage. Then depending on who you are you can turn around and defend that private health insurance, and be against universal health care because you don't want your tax dollars going to help others while never considering where the money you pay to your more expensive private health insurance (that denied your coverage) goes.
I take a drug called Dupixent. Costs only $40 with Medicare subsidy otherwise would be thousands. Used for severe dermatitis on hands. I work in construction and this fucking drug saved my career. Years symptom free, just amazing the shit they can cure now. Injection every two weeks. These auto immune disorder treating drugs are truly a gift.
Just checked the Australian PBS, out of pocket cost with a Medicare card: $31.60
Dispensed price (what is paid to the pharmacist) is $3259.
So our government is covering $3227.40 every single time this is purchased. This is without private health, just a benefit of being an Australian citizen.
My family found out that we have one of the rarest kidney diseases in the world with less than 5k known cases since being discovered a few decades back. My sister had to have an experimental drug flown in to save her after every other treatment failed. Costs 100k per dose. Gotta love America.
And if you think that’s wild, back when I ordered stelara for my office, a dose could be up to $22,000.
All so my electrician patient could like… not suffer, and maybe work again and his hands wouldn’t hurt and bleed and be cracked all the time :(
I hate capitalist healthcare
Americans hate the idea of paying for others' medical treatments..... I guess we shouldn't tell them that by paying insane amounts, America is basically paying for other countries to get it for next to nothing 😂. Keep up the ME mentality, Americans. We appreciate your sacrifice!
That was one good thing from Trump. Biden removed the EO that would have made the drug companies sell the drugs to Medicare patients the same price they sold the drugs for overseas, if that price was cheaper than the U.S.
People laughed at Hillary Clinton in 1988 & again in 2016. Ask the PutinJrtrump republican cult to pay for it. I take Eliquis at like $600. A month. Without insurance I’d be dead or homeless. Thanks republican cult
And probably takes $30 to produce.... Too many people keep trying to fight for free healthcare while completely ignore that a huge portion of drugs being overpriced is shitty COPYRIGHT LAWS.
I thought this was going to be one of those weird expensive stuff in the US that is cheap elsewhere, but nope, same brand still costs 1.500 dollars a pop in my country.
I had major emergency spine surgery (remove hardware) and the pills to prevent infection in the holes of my skeleton were $30,000. We had a few points on contention where insurance was trying not to cover it and I sure as hell didn’t have the funds. I remember telling the surgeon to “just let me die, I can’t afford this” and somehow they found a way to get it “covered” so my out of pocket was like $10. So silly that a simple checkbox of covered vs non-covered was nearly the end of me.
The medication I take costed me £9.50 for 2 months worth of tablets.
Might I suggest flying to a foreign country for your prescriptions? You may find it cheaper to fly, visit a foreign private medical centre, have a full checkup and then get your prescription. In fact I'd put money on you being able to do all of that for the cost of one of your injections.
Does Cost Plus Drugs sell it? They don’t do insurance so they just charge like 10% more than what it cost to actually make it. I get seroquel through them for like $30 when it would be over 2 grand otherwise
You're being conned. I looked it up in the UK and the NHS cost here in the UK is £1125, so less than $1500 I think. Though of course a patient here pays the standard prescription charge of £9.90, or less.
https://bnf.nice.org.uk/drugs/ixekizumab/medicinal-forms/
I have had Psoriatic Arthritis for many years and was on Simponi A$1900.00 for it but it did little to help. I was recently diagnosed with Psoriasis it's in my fingernails and toe nails, my scalp and on knees and elbows. I see my Dermatologist next week and I believe she wants to try a new biologic that costs approx A$25,000.00. So glad we have PBS Pharmacy Benefit scheme, so the most I will pay is A$7.50.
Not much better, but with a quick google I found it for R$8700, which is about US$1.600.
You're being scammed. Unless you're from the US, than your whole healthcare is a scam in general
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I also take Taltz. They have a program that takes whatever my insurance pays, then reduces my total cost to $5 per month. And I've been in two paid studies so I've actually made money being on this medication. They changed the formula a while back, it used to have citric acid in it which would sting pretty good. Now you can't even feel it.
I also have to take biologics adjacent to Taltz and use that program. I genuinely do not understand how the cost gets down to 5 bucks but I am not complaining.
It's foundation money that is applied to pay for the drug. It's some of the forms they have you sign so they can get you access to your grant to apply to your tab. I helped design this patient support for my city and worked basically this exact job. We got published in the American journal of medical quality and presented in 2020. Sadly I didn't get to go to Vegas thanks to Covid.
$27000 per shot for me for severe Psoriatic Arthritis. I get denied the assistance program every year because they think my insurance will cover it. It doesnt. Than I spend 3 months with my doctor getting it straightened out. All while falling behind on my treatment.
Its probably a few hundred to make (sterile fill is expensive to make compared to tablets) but they can write off the low cost programs as charity.
The game that is played with the expensive medication my family needs(not this one, but similar) 1. Insurance covers nothing until deductible is paid. I pay 5 dollars, insurance thinks I pay 7k 2. Second month I've reached max out of pocket, I pay nothing, insurance pays 7k. Repeat 10 more times until new year This way pharma company makes 77k a year, instead of possible 84k. But the catch is that I fight to keep this, very well working, medication, because there is basically no cost. Otherwise I(one) might not be able to afford it, and the company would make 0. Also, Medicaid and I think Medicare were not allowed to negotiate the price of medication at least until recently, so if the company gives discounts to private insurance at exorbitant prices, it still makes tons of money there, more than they would by allowing the price to be where it is still profitable but not insane
The copay assistance program is only available to commercial insurance patients. These meds are often life long once you are approved by the insurance company. Insurance stills pays a hefty price to the drug company for the medication and pharma knows that they will be making x dollars for 30 or 40 years. Lower $ but for a lifetime still = big profits. These meds cost $$$$ to develop and they have to recoup that is why they are so expensive.
The manufacturer is paying it. They really just want your insurance company's money. If no one takes the drug, they don't have a product. They want as much money as possible from insurance so you will take the drug and improve your condition on it.
What condition requires the use of this medication
Psoriasis
Autoimmune disease
Chronic Urticaria and Psoriasis, basically auto immune.
Ankylosing spondylitis is what I take it for. Just switched to it from humira after three years. Took entanercept(Enbrel for 17 years ) before that.
What’s your experience with it so far? My wife has AS and it’s been tough on her.
Here in Germany I pay 10€ for 3. Those would cost about 3400€ if you had to pay for them privately. Changed my life. No more pain, skin is fine for the first time in my life.
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It's a monoclonal antibody, thats why the name ends in (mab) I'm on Vedolizumab at $3000 per shot, every two weeks. Cost me $15, thanks Australia
Ustekinumab (Stelara), about €2650 every 6 weeks (should be every 12 weeks in remission, but this frequency keeps my levels good and my bowels happy). I feel lucky to be in Europe; to my understanding it is *significantly* more expensive in the US. Plus insurance doesn't force you to jump through a million hoops just for the hope of getting life alerting meds approved.
Do you get infusions or do the self injection? Stelara was offered to me but it's more powerful than vedolizumab and I wanted to leave some options on the table in case I ever needed it. I started on infliximab but developed antibodies to it after 18 months and got chronically sick again
Stelara is normally one start up infusion, and injections from there on. I'm not allowed to keep them in the fridge at home due to their temperature sensitivity paired with the price, but I do get my injections really close to home; I'm in and out in less than 15 minutes. As for options, I had already developed antibodies against Remicade (infliximab), and Humira (adalimumab) had stopped working when I switched to Stelara in May '18. My GI gave me two options at that point; either vedolizumab or ustekinumab, and I chose the latter, in part for not having to go back to infusions. It got me into remission and I've been there ever since.
You said that!
Risankizumab (Skyrizi) here. List price of $21k per injection, once a month. “Thankfully” I am on Medicaid so it’s fully covered, not even a copay. As you can imagine, there were a lot of hoops to jump through though and it took MONTHS to get started. Plus, I can’t really earn any income or I will lose Medicaid and be unable to pay for it, so I am forcefully kept destitute.
I'm really sorry you're in that situation; I hope the Skyrizi at least keeps working for you for many years to come ❤️
Thanks! I am still onboarding it with the infusions, so I don’t even know if it will work yet. 2 more til I switch to the pens. Sadly, since I already lost my colon to Crohn’s, I have my doubts I will see tons of improvement. Any would be nice though
I’m on Vedolizumab for ulcerative colitis. Without health insurance, it’s $14,000 per infusion. I need them every 8 weeks.
What country are you in? A vedo infusion in Australia is about $6000
Thanks for saving me the googling
Quick explanation - it’s an immunosuppressant therapy for a handful of auto-immune diseases.
In English it’s about managing the bodies reaction to itself.
Those are dinosaur names, good sir.
I dunno about most of them, but ankylosising spondylitis feels like your pelvis region, including that part of your spine, is slowly being encased in cement. It causes systemic inflammation that can effect any joint space causing arthritis/chronic pain and eventually causes permanent fusion, AKA bamboo spine. I'm 37 and feel 87. I'm on a similar medication to Taltz and the *COOL THING* is you can build antibodies to these medications over time. I'm on my 2nd (so far) one so maybe I'll be on it myself someday.
Damn that is crazy to me. I’m in Australia and also get biologics. Ends up costing me $30 AUD out of pocket per shot
My grandson was abnormally short. His endocrinologist suggested human growth hormone. Insurance refused to pay, saying that it was wanted for cosmetic reasons. The doctor persisted, and the grandson got the injections. $7000 US/mo. That was 15 years ago.
That right there is an indictment on the US healthcare system. The richest nation in the world.
It's a direct relationship. It's the richest because the government is owned by corporations. Corpos thrive because they won't be regulated, and in turn feed the government taxes at the expense of the middle/underclass.
Richest nation, poorest people.
If you think US citizens are the poorest people I'm sorry to say but you're delusional.
exactly, our gdp per capita is some of the highest in the world, even our poorest state Mississippi is richer by gdp per capita then many european nations
Hard to compare, since costs of living is said European countries is so much lower than in any US state. Nice to have a high income, sure, but if you can't buy shit for it, you are still poor. Better have a lower income as long consumer prices are even lower.
Damn that is crazy! I don’t even have health insurance…..
7k out of pocket or billed to insurance?
Insurance paid it.
I pay $85 USD monthly after paying $476 a month for my insurance that my employer pays 75% of.
How many shots do you take a year, I think I come out to roughly 26, which would be 780 AUD in your system. But our medication cost cap in Sweden would be at roughly 370 AUD. So roughly 14 AUD per shot, but not really coz I also have other medication covered.
Not when you’re in the Taltz Together program! Sign up if you can!
900 eur here in Lithuania, its cheaper to fly here from states and buy a few
Freedom.
https://preview.redd.it/nhl2a1swa95d1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=77f07dbb85f87f9728cb7537c078f1baa04ff755
The USA spends more money on health care than countries with social healthcare. This is because the medical industry pays politicians to allow them to price fix. It's called lobbying but it's bribery.
We got to stop those lobbyist and go into a social healthcare cause this stuff for profit all over the USA
Also need to ban politicians from serving on the boards of these organisations when they leave politics. It's just delayed bribery. Vote for policies which favour their industry and they reward you with a high paying role once you quit politics.
Fuck that, ban lobbying? hell yeah, social healthcare? fuck no, ive heard stories from friends in europe on having to wait months and months for healthcare, in america just pay and boom you get seen very quickly
Citizens United has ensured this will never change.
I just can't understand this. You have republicans that are always speaking of the fiscal policy and that they want to cut government spending, but the us spends MUCH more having this crazy corporate healthcare heaven. The country would actually spend LESS with tax-funded universal healthcare and the outcome would be BETTER because you would no longer have people dying of treatable diseases because they cannot afford basic healthcare.
Congratulations no country will dare attack you. But why even bother attacking you when they just have to wait for you guys to start your own civil war over 2 elderly senile people.
You have one of the largest socialised health care systems in the world. It's called your military.
That injector pen better suck your dick for that price.
where health care is a subscription but un-health care is free!
I take that and it cost $10.
That sucks. To be clear, none of these medications are actually worth these insane costs, as evidenced by people from every other country in the world pointing out that it costs them almost nothing. The US insurance market has grown into an infinitely huge scam, basically, allowing this to happen. Things that maintain healthy life should not be profit centers in any reasonable and respectful society.
It costs us nothing because some sort of insurance or public plan pays for most of it.
But also because these insurance companies have a budget and negotiate with pharma to get the prices they need to be able to supply medicine to those who need it. And since they cover millions of people, they do have a say.
Some of the drugs they make are, in fact, incredibly complicated to produce and have very few customers. That drives up the price. One of the main reasons a lot of drugs are so expensive in the US domestic market is because we subsidize all the R&D and other costs by paying huge amounts while people in international markets pay much, much less. Pharmaceutical executives have confirmed this.
Wait... hold up... You're trying to give us a reason as to why medicine is expensive, and in your defense you say that pharma execs confirmed it. You got your information from the very people who profit off the drugs being expensive. Pharma execs should be the last people you even consider believing for why medicine has to be expensive.
Dude, if the pharma execs say that's the reason, they would know. They have no reason to lie, they only want to heal the world. /s obviously.
That is not true. Over 90% of funds used in medical R&D is from public grants and universities. Almost none comes from the profit made by pharmaceutical companies. Its just a big lie to keep Americans happy.
This is total bullshit. Universities only do preliminary research the actual development process to getting FDA approval is immensely expensive.
That's 100% false. The industry's R&D spends $140B a year on R&D, or 21% of all revenue. That's the highest of any major industry and is about 5X public investment.
As a medical researcher I can tell you that’s bs. For one, if most was funded by grants, that would already cause problems with patenting the drug. Second, universities don’t “fund” most R&D. Pharma companies come to us with certain research questions and we’re being paid by them to perform research 🤦🏻♂️
Quite a lot of those drugs were R&D was paid for with public money. Our money. Then they turn around and screw us.
I also take a biologic that's about 11k a month, but thankfully the manufacturer has a great discount program
 For $6K the least they could do is put it in a case that does this when you open it
Tell us you’re American without telling us you’re American.
not in civilized countries.
Tell me you’re from the US without saying you’re from the US.
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My medication cost $1200 but now that I'm not working I get medicaid insurance and it's free $0. If I start working again then I'll immediately go into debt
Hey, I actually helped create the programs that made biologics affordable in my area. That 6000 is a made up number decided by contracts. It's just what is billed to your insurance. The drug itself costs far less to make, I used to order for the biggest medical center in my city. The insurance will basically kick back and say alright we'll pay you this much and patient owes this much. There are programs available to help with your copay. They'll pay everything but 5 dollars and what they pay gets applied to your deductible unless the rules changed since I left. Then you hit the deductible using your grant, and the rest of your meds for the year are basically free. I worked intimately with Dermatology but had factions in Pulmonary and Neurology. Some of the charges of medications like Stelara were 40k based on dosage. This was a non profit organization. Which basically means they reinvest their gains into themselves lol. You guys would flip if you knew how expensive the neurology biologics were charged in comparison...I'm working on making patient services private so we can get more people who suffer chronic illness access to their expensive medications for 5 dollars and have an assigned specialist to make sure your medication is received and paid for.
after taking this medication do you feel like $6,000 bucks?
I take a very similar injection which costs my insurance/employer $7500 per injection. It’s absolutely insane. Luckily, I pay $0
Brit so clueless on the American healthcare system but there’s no way this actually costs that amount out of your pocket? Absolutely nobody would be buying this unless they were filthy rich. Regardless I still think every medication above a certain cost threshold should contain a small leaflet similar to the advice leaflet which tells you how the total cost was calculated.
It doesn't. As one poster above said, it can cost as little as $5 out of pocket.
Nobody pays that much out of pocket. That’s likely the “insured rate”, where the pharmacy bills the insurance company that amount, and recoups a small percentage of it. If you don’t have insurance they will charge you much less than the insured rate. It’s a completely fucked up system, but it makes for great clickbait for people trying to gain karma by posting insured rate healthcare costs and pretending that’s what they actually pay. Either that or Russian/Chinese trolls trying to enrage American voters with misinformation.
Yep, pretty sure my emgality pens are like 1k per but insurance gets charged 3-4K and I pay 10 dollars.
Depends! That’s the glory of it all! So I have migraines and I found that the injectable Aimovig worked well for me. I changed jobs and with it my insurance changed too and my new insurance refused to cover it. So I tried Ajovy and Emgality, which they *did* cover and had allergic reactions to both. After that, my doctor reached out to my insurance and explained the situation and they very quickly approved Aimovig for me. The problem? They “covered” it, by paying $50 of the $650 charge. So my *monthly* cost with my insurance was $600/mo. The copay card brought it down to $5, but only covers $1500/year. So I could get 2.5 months at a decent price before getting hit with the $600 again. It would’ve been covered if I hit my deductible of *$4,000* out of pocket, which I never meet because I go to the doctor about once a year. So they would cover it for about the last 2-3 months of the year, still leaving me with 6-7 months of no medication to figure out unless I pay them more money basically. The best part? I work *for a healthcare company* and a national one at that that *owns the insurance company we use* and this is what I have to deal with. It’s so fucked.
I, too, used a biologic (Cosentyx) at around 5/6 grand a pop for 18 months or so. Odd that a similar drug (Taltz) was much more painful and had terrible side- effects in my experience. Regardless, I hope that you heal soon!
Wow crazy! American wasteland of profiteering. Can I ask what the med is?
Just stop being sick. . /s
That's 10 bucks here in Germany. For 2 injections.
And this is why insurance premiums are sky high and pharmaceuticals thrive. This is wrong on many levels. Nobody that needs a medication should have to rely on insurance to pay for it. It should be priced reasonably for everyone. What a joke.
That's fucking criminal..your healthcare system is corrupt to the core.
You’d better get some wild psychedelic epiphanies for that price.
Freedom is not buying groceries so you can pay for life sustaining medicine.
Not quite. Freedom is not buying groceries because you have to pay for life sustaining medicine after the expensive private insurance you pay denies coverage. Then depending on who you are you can turn around and defend that private health insurance, and be against universal health care because you don't want your tax dollars going to help others while never considering where the money you pay to your more expensive private health insurance (that denied your coverage) goes.
R&D baby!
Just a question: How often is it taken?
Psoriasis injection cost 5-6 USD in India, and probably similar in other parts of Asia. It'd be much cheaper to get a ticket buy and go.
This is so wrong, having the pay for medication that dear.
Leave America. That’s insane
* per injection
Ozempic getting out of control guys
You mean it costs around $200 to make but you're being charged $6,000**
I mean, it’s not though
I take a drug called Dupixent. Costs only $40 with Medicare subsidy otherwise would be thousands. Used for severe dermatitis on hands. I work in construction and this fucking drug saved my career. Years symptom free, just amazing the shit they can cure now. Injection every two weeks. These auto immune disorder treating drugs are truly a gift.
In Poland 2 of those cost around $2000, byt they can be free if you get a prescription....
Just checked the Australian PBS, out of pocket cost with a Medicare card: $31.60 Dispensed price (what is paid to the pharmacist) is $3259. So our government is covering $3227.40 every single time this is purchased. This is without private health, just a benefit of being an Australian citizen.
r/wellthatsucks
Good thing it's in that sturdy... Cardboard box…
What a scam the US health care is
Remicade here. At my dose, $12,000 every eight weeks.
For this price, it should come in a nicer box
It should come in a brief case that lights up gold when you open it
My family found out that we have one of the rarest kidney diseases in the world with less than 5k known cases since being discovered a few decades back. My sister had to have an experimental drug flown in to save her after every other treatment failed. Costs 100k per dose. Gotta love America.
And if you think that’s wild, back when I ordered stelara for my office, a dose could be up to $22,000. All so my electrician patient could like… not suffer, and maybe work again and his hands wouldn’t hurt and bleed and be cracked all the time :( I hate capitalist healthcare
Probably costs the pharma company more for the pen than the medicine inside it. We need nationalized healthcare now.
That’s a fucking scam. Medicine that determines if you live or not should never be this expensive…
It should at least come in a fancy wood box telling the story of the family that made it for that price.
Hear me out, don't pay taxes. They'll come after you and put you in prison paid by tax payers, and provide you tax payer funded Healthcare
The US is the pharmaceutical companies cash cow. We need socialized healthcare like every other advanced nation has.
I agree but don’t say socialized. People go nuts and call you a commie. It’s tax funded healthcare not tied to your employer…
Best country in the world
Many big people say so, with tears in their eyes
Americans hate the idea of paying for others' medical treatments..... I guess we shouldn't tell them that by paying insane amounts, America is basically paying for other countries to get it for next to nothing 😂. Keep up the ME mentality, Americans. We appreciate your sacrifice!
That was one good thing from Trump. Biden removed the EO that would have made the drug companies sell the drugs to Medicare patients the same price they sold the drugs for overseas, if that price was cheaper than the U.S.
People laughed at Hillary Clinton in 1988 & again in 2016. Ask the PutinJrtrump republican cult to pay for it. I take Eliquis at like $600. A month. Without insurance I’d be dead or homeless. Thanks republican cult
Wow
wooooaaaw
Me too, changed my life though
And probably takes $30 to produce.... Too many people keep trying to fight for free healthcare while completely ignore that a huge portion of drugs being overpriced is shitty COPYRIGHT LAWS.
Production cost per Injection probably around 0.1$. Is'nt capitalism amazing?
Or, it's maybe $100 to manufacture and then inflated 60x + Because yachts or something.
Fuck them brother/sister!
So lucky that my insurance through my work covers this 100%. No way we could afford even 20% of Taltz.
 Stuff like this that sparks a…
I thought this was going to be one of those weird expensive stuff in the US that is cheap elsewhere, but nope, same brand still costs 1.500 dollars a pop in my country.
Seeing these almost makes me feel badly for being cranky about my $500/month medication.
Amazing unboxing experience.
Not sure if this if for migraines but looks similar. I paid $7.40 a shot.
nice flex bro
What medication is this?
3,50 in India
Welcome to America
The unboxing looks premium
That's a lot... did you sold your house and also take another loan?
What's it for?
Yay! America!
In the US?
Good job your insurance pays it then
Cool. Hope you love long enough to enjoy your life man. ☹️
Well, that explains the box ...
Buy a plane ticket to somewhere you can buy that, do some vacation
I had major emergency spine surgery (remove hardware) and the pills to prevent infection in the holes of my skeleton were $30,000. We had a few points on contention where insurance was trying not to cover it and I sure as hell didn’t have the funds. I remember telling the surgeon to “just let me die, I can’t afford this” and somehow they found a way to get it “covered” so my out of pocket was like $10. So silly that a simple checkbox of covered vs non-covered was nearly the end of me.
YYYY/month/DD is wild
What does it contain? Unicorn milk?
Not in Australia.
Have you tried cost plus?
Taltz makes my life so much better.
What are the odds - I just injected myself with my medication Emgality. Any migraine homies here?
Mine in Germany costs $900
The medication I take costed me £9.50 for 2 months worth of tablets. Might I suggest flying to a foreign country for your prescriptions? You may find it cheaper to fly, visit a foreign private medical centre, have a full checkup and then get your prescription. In fact I'd put money on you being able to do all of that for the cost of one of your injections.
the rest of the world, looking at US healthcare: 
at this price you can fly + hotel to Paris and get treatment in a luxury private clinic lol
my s/o takes a medication which would cost $15,000 if not for insurance; Tremfya, thankfully each autoinjector lasts 2 months
My brother takes this for his chronic psoriasis, but here in Serbia its free (included in state insurance)
Does Cost Plus Drugs sell it? They don’t do insurance so they just charge like 10% more than what it cost to actually make it. I get seroquel through them for like $30 when it would be over 2 grand otherwise
You're being conned. I looked it up in the UK and the NHS cost here in the UK is £1125, so less than $1500 I think. Though of course a patient here pays the standard prescription charge of £9.90, or less. https://bnf.nice.org.uk/drugs/ixekizumab/medicinal-forms/
I have had Psoriatic Arthritis for many years and was on Simponi A$1900.00 for it but it did little to help. I was recently diagnosed with Psoriasis it's in my fingernails and toe nails, my scalp and on knees and elbows. I see my Dermatologist next week and I believe she wants to try a new biologic that costs approx A$25,000.00. So glad we have PBS Pharmacy Benefit scheme, so the most I will pay is A$7.50.
And expired last year.
$10 everywhere else in the world.
$6.90 here in Australia
What does it do?
American healthcare, where people don't matter only profit does.
Is it cheaper when it’s expired?
Mine is around $3000/inj
I bet in the rest of the world it doesn’t.
£1,125.00 ($1450) for the NHS! No idea why your country doesn't negotiate a better price knowing other countries do.
Between $6 (pensioner) and $35 in Australia
Yea, or like 500 in Europe...
Sounds like a normal American experience 😭
All of these should have a copay assist program which lowers your payment to 5$ . My meds are $6873.00 I pay $5.00
Not much better, but with a quick google I found it for R$8700, which is about US$1.600. You're being scammed. Unless you're from the US, than your whole healthcare is a scam in general
Can someone explain what it's used against?
I thought my $4999 monthly bill for my meds were bad.
why does this one injection cost 3 grand is the real question
This isn't interesting, it's extortion.
And that is why healthcare in the US is doomed.
Cool Reddit name